This year our class is taking on the challenge of trying to solve some of the issues that have plagued our globe over the past twenty years. This page is designed to record our journey along the way as well as serve as a dumping ground for any information that we may come across as we begin and continue to research a possible solution.
Global Issue #1:
The following document will serve as a template for you to follow as you go along and begin organizing you information.
Solving the Issues of the World…One Friday at a Time
Group Names:_ Josh & Ryan
Global Issue #1: Poverty
Background of Issue: (who?, what?, where?, when?, why?) -Who? Poverty is a problem all over the world. There are people in every country that are affected by poverty. Poverty is not just a United States issue, it is a world issue -What? The poverty that strikes the people of the
United States of America. Air Conditioning, Cable TV, and Xbox would be the opposite of being poor. The true definition of poverty is the state of being inferior in quality or insufficient in amount. What is poverty? Poverty is hunger, being sick and not being able to see a doctor, lack of shelter, not access to school and not being able to read, not having a job, fearing the future, living one day at a time, losing a child to illness due to unclean water, powerlessness, lack of representation and freedom, and finally is just not having anything. Every 1 in 8 Americans live in poverty (as of 2007). To reduce poverty and hunger, the United States needs to set a national goal to decrease poverty. Georgia has the 3rd highest poverty rate among the states. 1.8 million out of the 9, 815,210 people in Georgia live in poverty. Georgia is also ranked as 8th in the nation for the number of uninsured residents, at a rate of 19.4%. Only Florida, Louisiana, Mississippi, Nevada, New Mexico, South Carolina, and Texas had higher rats of uninsured residents. Number of Georgians on Food Stamps have increased every year since 2007, and in 2010 stood at more than 590,000 households -- nearly 1.4 million people.
MARRIAGE DROPS THE PROBABILITY OF CHILD POVERTY BY 81%
Marriage and Child Poverty
74% OF POOR FAMILIES WITH CHILDREN ARE NOT MARRIED
Marriage and Child Poverty
48 Contiguous States and the District of Columbia
Persons in family/household
Poverty guideline
1
$11,170
2
15,130
3
19,090
4
23,050
5
27,010
6
30,970
7
34,930
8
38,890
For families/households with more than 8 persons,
add $3,960 for each additional person.
Poverty Video (YouTube) -Where? Poverty is not just a problem in America, as seen in the graph below. Poverty is a issue that Child Poverty in countries over the World
A Start Towards Poverty -When? Poverty has been around for a long time. Poverty began to grow very serious in the late 1950s.
Almost half the world — over 3 billion people — live on less than $2.50 a day.
The GDP (Gross Domestic Product) of the 41 Heavily Indebted Poor Countries (567 million people) is less than the wealth of the world’s 7 richest people combined.
Nearly a billion people entered the 21st century unable to read a book or sign their names.
Less than one per cent of what the world spent every year on weapons was needed to put every child into school by the year 2000 and yet it didn’t happen.
1 billion children live in poverty (1 in 2 children in the world). 640 million live without adequate shelter, 400 million have no access to safe water, 270 million have no access to health services. 10.6 million died in 2003 before they reached the age of 5 (or roughly 29,000 children per day).
Poverty is the a big problem for the world’s people and nations.Is it the poor’s fault? They could be lazy, make bad decisions, be responsible for their current situation, etc. Was it their government’s fault? The causes could go both ways. The governments of poor nations and their people are powerless, thus making poverty a nation wide problem. The poorest people will have less access to health, education, and other services along those lines. If you are wealthier, you usually have more economic benefit and influence than the poor. Countries spend more money on their military, financial bailouts, and other areas that will benefit the wealthy economically. All the money is being spent on these other resources for the wealth when there is no amount being added to the daily crisis of poverty. Poverty is the a big problem for the world’s people and nations.Is it the poor’s fault? They could be lazy, make bad decisions, be responsible for their current situation, etc. Was it their government’s fault? The causes could go both ways. The governments of poor nations and their people are powerless, thus making poverty a nation wide problem. The poorest people will have less access to health, education, and other services along those lines. If you are wealthier, you usually have more economic benefit and influence than the poor. Countries spend more money on their military, financial bailouts, and other areas that will benefit the wealthy economically. All the money is being spent on these other resources for the wealth when there is no amount being added to the daily crisis of poverty.
Costs: human and/or financial cost? The poorer you are, the more things cost. More in time and money. The poor pay more for things middle class Americans take for granted. The poor don't have a car to take to the supermarket. So they buy groceries at the corner store where a gallon of milk costs a dollar more. A loaf of bread there costs 2.99 for white and 3.79 for wheat. The clerk says the gallon of leaking milk in the back color is 4.99, and she holds up 4 fingers to clarify. Prices on urban corner stores are much higher. Sometimes supermarkets in poor neighborhoods are high too. The real estate is higher. This effects the poor greatly because they are paying more than normal and is harming them financially.
Previous Efforts Put Into Place to Help Resolve Issue: MICROCREDIT. Microcredit is pretty much small loans given to people who lack employment and a verifiable credit history. It is made to not only increase entrepreneurship but to decrease poverty. It is also used to empower women and uplift entire communities by extension. The popularity has grown in recent years, as more and more organizations view it as an important tool in poverty
Poverty Reduction through Self-help
Rediscovering the Cooperative Advantage
Johnston Birchall International Labour Organisation, 2003
Summary
This study examines the role and potential of cooperatives in reducing poverty. It includes an analysis of what we understand by the terms poverty and cooperatives and discusses the poverty reduction policies of international organisations and how cooperatives could help achieve their objectives. The historical record of cooperatives in poverty reduction and eleven case studies from different fields of current cooperative activity are presented. A key conclusion of the study is that self-help organisations by the poor is a pre-condition for successful anti-poverty work and that cooperatives can play an important role in this struggle.
A History of Self-help and Cooperative Action
The purpose of this study is to explore the relationship between the cooperative from of organisation and the reduction of poverty. There are good reasons for thinking that cooperatives might have an important role in the global effort, led by the United Nations, to halve the level of poverty by 2015. After all, it was poor people who originally invented cooperatives as a form of economic association that would help them to climb out of poverty. The history of cooperatives is full of evidence of their ability to increase their members’ incomes, decrease the risks they run, and enable them to become full participants in civic society. The principles on which cooperatives are based, and on which they are distinguished from other forms of business organisation, point to a concern with democratic control by the members, the equitable return of economic surpluses, and a desire to share these benefits with other people in similar circumstances. However, their history also provides evidence of the limitations of cooperatives. They have a tendency, once established, to appeal more to people on low to middle incomes than to the very poor. In the developed world, they have had a tendency to grow and to rely more and more on professional management, which has meant their being distanced from their members and becoming more like conventional businesses. In the developing world, they have often been used as tools of development by governments that have not allowed them to become fully autonomous, member-owned businesses.
What is the Cooperative contribution to Poverty Reduction?
What potential does the cooperative form have in practice to reduce poverty? The question is an important one. It is part of a wider question, about what forms of economic and social organisation the poor need in order to help themselves out of poverty. This is part of an even wider question about what techniques should be used by international development agencies, non-governmental organisations, national and local governments to achieve sustainable development that is targeted on the poor. The question is also an urgent one. The United Nations is co-ordinating a huge, global effort to reduce poverty and all the other disadvantages and deprivations that keep people poor. If the cooperative form is good at reducing poverty and is overlooked, then the Millennium Development Goals may be harder to achieve. If its potential is overestimated, development effort may be wasted. We need to have a wide-ranging debate about just what cooperative businesses can contribute to the reduction of poverty. This study aims to help stimulate and contribute to such a debate.
Study Contents
In Chapter One the study defines what is meant by poverty, and cooperatives and other self-help organisations in relation to cooperative principles. It then explores the historical record of cooperatives, briefly evaluating their past contribution to poverty reduction, and asks how relevant they are to current needs and priorities. The conclusion is that cooperatives have great potential, but as part of a wider set of more or less formal self-help organisations. In practice, this form of member-owned business should only be used if the poor themselves see its potential.
In Chapter Two the policies of international organisations that have responsibility for achieving the Millennium Development Goals are examined, and the question is posed as to what the contribution of cooperatives and self-help organisations might be. A particular focus is on the international financial institutions - the IMF and World Bank - and their Poverty Reduction Strategies and the Decent Work Strategy of the International Labour Organisation (ILO). The conclusion is that cooperatives have the potential to contribute to the Poverty Reduction Strategies of a wide range of international organisations and countries, but that this potential could be much better recognised.
In Chapter Three, eleven case studies are presented that illustrate how various types of cooperative, in a wide variety of situations, in developed and developing countries, are in practice lifting their members out of poverty. The study asks what they have achieved, what setbacks they have experienced, whether their experience has wider significance, and how replicable they are. The conclusion is that cooperatives and similar member-owned businesses are an extremely flexible form that can be adapted successfully to solve a variety of economic problems. However, their successful application requires a great deal of promotional effort, attention to detail, and investment in human capital.
Finally, in Chapter Four the study examines the relationship between cooperative development and the more general process of participatory development. The conclusions are that the development of cooperatives and similar self-help organisations is a vital aspect of participatory development, and that without some form of self-organisation by the poor wider development would not be sustainable. The poor must be involved in the ownership of the development process, through their own local, democratically controlled economic organisations. If the cooperative form did not exist, it would have to be invented. The study ends with some recommendations to strengthen the work of the ILO and other international organisations in making a cooperative contribution to poverty reduction.
To obtain a copy of the study:
Rediscovering the cooperative advantage: Poverty reduction through self-help
Johnston Birchall
International Labour Organisation, Geneva, 2003
ISBN 92-2-113603-5
Copies can be obtained from the International Labour Organisation
4, route des Morillons, CH-1211 Geneva 22, Switzerland or e-mail: pubvente@ilo.org
Further Information on ILO support to Cooperatives
For further information on the International Labour Organisation’s activities in support of cooperatives contact:
Reasons why previous efforts to help resolve issue have failed:
Areas of concern on reaching your desired solution to the global issue:
YOUR PLAN OF ACTION! (for this section, you will need to provide the most detail as you lay a step-by-step plan on how your group will go about tackling this issue. It is important that you take a look at all the information you have researched and studied and use that information to develop a true, realistic and effective plan of action. The plan needs to include funding, people involved, time length of project, materials needed, etc…)
This year our class is taking on the challenge of trying to solve some of the issues that have plagued our globe over the past twenty years. This page is designed to record our journey along the way as well as serve as a dumping ground for any information that we may come across as we begin and continue to research a possible solution.
Global Issue #1:
The following document will serve as a template for you to follow as you go along and begin organizing you information.
Solving the Issues of the World…One Friday at a Time
Group Names:_ Josh & Ryan
Global Issue #1: Poverty
Background of Issue: (who?, what?, where?, when?, why?)
-Who? Poverty is a problem all over the world. There are people in every country that are affected by poverty. Poverty is not just a United States issue, it is a world issue
-What? The poverty that strikes the people of the
United States of America. Air Conditioning, Cable TV, and Xbox would be the opposite of being poor. The true definition of poverty is the state of being inferior in quality or insufficient in amount. What is poverty? Poverty is hunger, being sick and not being able to see a doctor, lack of shelter, not access to school and not being able to read, not having a job, fearing the future, living one day at a time, losing a child to illness due to unclean water, powerlessness, lack of representation and freedom, and finally is just not having anything. Every 1 in 8 Americans live in poverty (as of 2007). To reduce poverty and hunger, the United States needs to set a national goal to decrease poverty. Georgia has the 3rd highest poverty rate among the states. 1.8 million out of the 9, 815,210 people in Georgia live in poverty. Georgia is also ranked as 8th in the nation for the number of uninsured residents, at a rate of 19.4%. Only Florida, Louisiana, Mississippi, Nevada, New Mexico, South Carolina, and Texas had higher rats of uninsured residents. Number of Georgians on Food Stamps have increased every year since 2007, and in 2010 stood at more than 590,000 households -- nearly 1.4 million people.
MARRIAGE DROPS THE PROBABILITY OF CHILD POVERTY BY 81%
74% OF POOR FAMILIES WITH CHILDREN ARE NOT MARRIED
48 Contiguous States and the District of Columbia
Persons in family/household
add $3,960 for each additional person.
Poverty Video (YouTube)
-Where? Poverty is not just a problem in America, as seen in the graph below. Poverty is a issue that
Child Poverty in countries over the World
A Start Towards Poverty
-When? Poverty has been around for a long time. Poverty began to grow very serious in the late 1950s.
Poverty by Age, 1990 and 2000
-Why?
CREDIT: Poverty Issues/Causes
Poverty is the a big problem for the world’s people and nations.Is it the poor’s fault? They could be lazy, make bad decisions, be responsible for their current situation, etc. Was it their government’s fault? The causes could go both ways. The governments of poor nations and their people are powerless, thus making poverty a nation wide problem. The poorest people will have less access to health, education, and other services along those lines. If you are wealthier, you usually have more economic benefit and influence than the poor. Countries spend more money on their military, financial bailouts, and other areas that will benefit the wealthy economically. All the money is being spent on these other resources for the wealth when there is no amount being added to the daily crisis of poverty.
Poverty is the a big problem for the world’s people and nations.Is it the poor’s fault? They could be lazy, make bad decisions, be responsible for their current situation, etc. Was it their government’s fault? The causes could go both ways. The governments of poor nations and their people are powerless, thus making poverty a nation wide problem. The poorest people will have less access to health, education, and other services along those lines. If you are wealthier, you usually have more economic benefit and influence than the poor. Countries spend more money on their military, financial bailouts, and other areas that will benefit the wealthy economically. All the money is being spent on these other resources for the wealth when there is no amount being added to the daily crisis of poverty.
Costs: human and/or financial cost? The poorer you are, the more things cost. More in time and money. The poor pay more for things middle class Americans take for granted. The poor don't have a car to take to the supermarket. So they buy groceries at the corner store where a gallon of milk costs a dollar more. A loaf of bread there costs 2.99 for white and 3.79 for wheat. The clerk says the gallon of leaking milk in the back color is 4.99, and she holds up 4 fingers to clarify. Prices on urban corner stores are much higher. Sometimes supermarkets in poor neighborhoods are high too. The real estate is higher. This effects the poor greatly because they are paying more than normal and is harming them financially.
The High Cost of Poverty
Previous Efforts Put Into Place to Help Resolve Issue: MICROCREDIT. Microcredit is pretty much small loans given to people who lack employment and a verifiable credit history. It is made to not only increase entrepreneurship but to decrease poverty. It is also used to empower women and uplift entire communities by extension. The popularity has grown in recent years, as more and more organizations view it as an important tool in poverty
Poverty Reduction through Self-help
Rediscovering the Cooperative Advantage
Johnston Birchall
International Labour Organisation, 2003
Summary
This study examines the role and potential of cooperatives in reducing poverty. It includes an analysis of what we understand by the terms poverty and cooperatives and discusses the poverty reduction policies of international organisations and how cooperatives could help achieve their objectives. The historical record of cooperatives in poverty reduction and eleven case studies from different fields of current cooperative activity are presented. A key conclusion of the study is that self-help organisations by the poor is a pre-condition for successful anti-poverty work and that cooperatives can play an important role in this struggle.
A History of Self-help and Cooperative Action
The purpose of this study is to explore the relationship between the cooperative from of organisation and the reduction of poverty. There are good reasons for thinking that cooperatives might have an important role in the global effort, led by the United Nations, to halve the level of poverty by 2015. After all, it was poor people who originally invented cooperatives as a form of economic association that would help them to climb out of poverty. The history of cooperatives is full of evidence of their ability to increase their members’ incomes, decrease the risks they run, and enable them to become full participants in civic society. The principles on which cooperatives are based, and on which they are distinguished from other forms of business organisation, point to a concern with democratic control by the members, the equitable return of economic surpluses, and a desire to share these benefits with other people in similar circumstances. However, their history also provides evidence of the limitations of cooperatives. They have a tendency, once established, to appeal more to people on low to middle incomes than to the very poor. In the developed world, they have had a tendency to grow and to rely more and more on professional management, which has meant their being distanced from their members and becoming more like conventional businesses. In the developing world, they have often been used as tools of development by governments that have not allowed them to become fully autonomous, member-owned businesses.
What is the Cooperative contribution to Poverty Reduction?
What potential does the cooperative form have in practice to reduce poverty? The question is an important one. It is part of a wider question, about what forms of economic and social organisation the poor need in order to help themselves out of poverty. This is part of an even wider question about what techniques should be used by international development agencies, non-governmental organisations, national and local governments to achieve sustainable development that is targeted on the poor. The question is also an urgent one. The United Nations is co-ordinating a huge, global effort to reduce poverty and all the other disadvantages and deprivations that keep people poor. If the cooperative form is good at reducing poverty and is overlooked, then the Millennium Development Goals may be harder to achieve. If its potential is overestimated, development effort may be wasted. We need to have a wide-ranging debate about just what cooperative businesses can contribute to the reduction of poverty. This study aims to help stimulate and contribute to such a debate.
Study Contents
In Chapter One the study defines what is meant by poverty, and cooperatives and other self-help organisations in relation to cooperative principles. It then explores the historical record of cooperatives, briefly evaluating their past contribution to poverty reduction, and asks how relevant they are to current needs and priorities. The conclusion is that cooperatives have great potential, but as part of a wider set of more or less formal self-help organisations. In practice, this form of member-owned business should only be used if the poor themselves see its potential.
In Chapter Two the policies of international organisations that have responsibility for achieving the Millennium Development Goals are examined, and the question is posed as to what the contribution of cooperatives and self-help organisations might be. A particular focus is on the international financial institutions - the IMF and World Bank - and their Poverty Reduction Strategies and the Decent Work Strategy of the International Labour Organisation (ILO). The conclusion is that cooperatives have the potential to contribute to the Poverty Reduction Strategies of a wide range of international organisations and countries, but that this potential could be much better recognised.
In Chapter Three, eleven case studies are presented that illustrate how various types of cooperative, in a wide variety of situations, in developed and developing countries, are in practice lifting their members out of poverty. The study asks what they have achieved, what setbacks they have experienced, whether their experience has wider significance, and how replicable they are. The conclusion is that cooperatives and similar member-owned businesses are an extremely flexible form that can be adapted successfully to solve a variety of economic problems. However, their successful application requires a great deal of promotional effort, attention to detail, and investment in human capital.
Finally, in Chapter Four the study examines the relationship between cooperative development and the more general process of participatory development. The conclusions are that the development of cooperatives and similar self-help organisations is a vital aspect of participatory development, and that without some form of self-organisation by the poor wider development would not be sustainable. The poor must be involved in the ownership of the development process, through their own local, democratically controlled economic organisations. If the cooperative form did not exist, it would have to be invented. The study ends with some recommendations to strengthen the work of the ILO and other international organisations in making a cooperative contribution to poverty reduction.
To obtain a copy of the study:
Rediscovering the cooperative advantage: Poverty reduction through self-help
Johnston Birchall
International Labour Organisation, Geneva, 2003
ISBN 92-2-113603-5
Copies can be obtained from the International Labour Organisation
4, route des Morillons, CH-1211 Geneva 22, Switzerland or e-mail: pubvente@ilo.org
Further Information on ILO support to Cooperatives
For further information on the International Labour Organisation’s activities in support of cooperatives contact:
Cooperative Branch
Job Creation and Enterprise Development Department
E-mail: coop@ilo.org
Web: http://www.ilo.org/coop
CREDIT: J Birchall
http://www.bread.org/institute/papers/briefing-paper-6.pdf
Reasons why previous efforts to help resolve issue have failed:
Areas of concern on reaching your desired solution to the global issue:
YOUR PLAN OF ACTION! (for this section, you will need to provide the most detail as you lay a step-by-step plan on how your group will go about tackling this issue. It is important that you take a look at all the information you have researched and studied and use that information to develop a true, realistic and effective plan of action. The plan needs to include funding, people involved, time length of project, materials needed, etc…)